For whatever reason a bunch of the venues we played had pinball machines, and good ones. We’d load in and the Hold Steady would soundcheck for a couple of hours so I’d just be sitting around. Kind of rough, long drives and a lot of downtime. “Then we did a tour with the Hold Steady in 2009 through a lot of Midwest cities. “I played a lot as a kid and then just kind of forgot about it,” Hartley explains. Hartley’s musical career directly contributed to his renewed love of pinball. He’s been a touring musician for years, and he’s absolutely obsessed with pinball. He released Oak Island, his second solo album under the name Nightlands, on Secretly Canadian earlier this year. He’s a member of the War on Drugs (a band that used to include Kurt Vile) and played bass on Sharon Van Etten’s first record.
You may not know Dave Hartley’s name, but you might’ve heard his music.
Hartley got in a car and drove back to Philadelphia, then got in a van and drove to North Carolina, where he recorded an album with the legendary producer Mitch Easter-yeah, the guy who recorded Murmur and Reckoning. But he never made it, forfeiting his final two rounds. He was only eight points away from a winning record headed into the final two decisive rounds. He finished in first place in two of his first three matches. He wasn’t just good that second day, though-he was great. He never expected to win any prize money or finish near the top, but with a good day he could still finish with a winning record, and that counts for something. It also brought lighter competition-Pinburgh reseeds after each round, and Hartley was now facing players with similar records. The second day of competition brought new hope. At the end of the first day Hartley’s record was 20-40, near the bottom of the standings. He stalled to another last-place finish in the second session, and went 2-10 in the fourth. At the end of that first round Hartley’s record was 1-11, well behind Sergio Johnson and Rick Prince, the veteran players he squared off against in Pinburgh’s first session. He didn’t fare much better at Big Indian or Last Action Hero. He noticed one of the first games he’d play was Simpsons Pinball Party and felt relieved-he knew this game. As the PAPA World Headquarters in Scott Township, Pennsylvania, filled with the sound of 450 pinball machines clinking to life, Hartley started the first of 10 four-player head-to-head rounds. It might be slightly more laidback than the World Pinball Championships, but it’s serious pinball.
#Pinball wizard band professional
And this wasn’t just some impromptu four-player at the corner bar-Pinburgh is one of two major annual tournaments run by the Professional and Amateur Pinball Association. The longtime pinball fan is a solid player and the best among his friends (except for maybe Severin Tucker, who talked Hartley into signing up for Pinburgh in the first place) but he’d never competed in an official tournament before. Dave Hartley didn’t know what to expect when he pulled the plunger on his first game at Pinburgh.
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